LINUXGAMES

Epic’s Mark Rein made the followingpost at their officialforums to state that Unreal Tournament3 will not be comprimised by shipping for several platforms:

I continue to be disappointed that folks on the internet treat any positivething we say about one platform as some sort of critique of another platform.We’re a multi-platform company folks please come to grips with that. We likethe PC. We like the 360. We like the PS3. We like the Macintosh. We likeLinux. We will deliver UT3 for all of these platforms and it will rock onevery one.[...]In fact the cool thing about our engine is that when you make content for oneplatform it can run on all of them. If history is any indication, the vastmajority of UT3 content won’t even come from Epic – it will come from somevery brilliant end users with lots of cool and innovative ideas.

Also, Gameplayerconducted an interview with Epic’sJeff Morris about UnrealTournament 3; the series’ numbering change, singleplayer campaign (“thenumber of people who go online with our ostensibly “multiplayer” game wasactually pretty small”), the addition of a hoverboard, the Warfare gametype(which combines UT2004′sAssault and Onslaught modes), and the timetable for a demo (a month prior toshipping, which would make it sometime in October), are all discussed.

Name/Version: Atomic Tank 2.5
Summary: Atanks is a multi-platform Scorched Earth clone similar to the Worms series of games. Annihilate the other tanks to earn money, then spend it on bigger and better shields and weapons to wipe out the opposition.
Screenshots [ View ] Download [ Atomic Tank 2.5 ]

Name/Version: Cultivation Version 8
Summary: Cultivation is a game about a community of gardeners growing food for themselves in a shared space.
Screenshots [ View ] Download [ Cultivation Version 8 ]

Name/Version: GameQ alpha 2.1
Summary: A PHP 5 library for querying game servers. It currently supports over 140 games, including all source (half-life), unreal and quake engine games, ase & gamespy protocols.
Download [ GameQ alpha 2.1 ]

Name/Version: qscore 0.0.6
Summary: Parse Quake3:Arena (and compatible) server.log into high scores and statistics
Screenshots [ View ] Download [ qscore 0.0.6 ]

Name/Version: SDL Asylum 0.2
Summary: Young Sigmund has a few problems. To help him resolve his mental instability you must enter the surreal world of his inner mind and shut down the malfunctioning brain cells. A port of Andy Southgate’s 1994 Acorn Archimedes platform shooter.
Screenshots [ View ] Download [ SDL Asylum 0.2 ]

Name/Version: Sturmbahnfahrer 1.5.1
Summary: A simulated obstacle course for automobiles
Screenshots [ View ] Download [ Sturmbahnfahrer 1.5.1 ]

Name/Version: WordPlay 0.3
Summary: Wordplay is a game for Unix/GTK+. It is primarily aimed at Scrabble(TM) players looking to improve their anagramming and hooking skills, but can also be played for fun. The dictionary used is the full OWL2 word list (used for tournaments and club play in the U.S. and Canada).
Screenshots [ View ] Download [ WordPlay 0.3 ]

Name/Version: Yabause 0.8.6
Summary: Yabause is a Sega Saturn emulator under GNU GPL.
Screenshots [ View ] Download [ Yabause 0.8.6 ]

ESReality.com hasposted a Unreal Tournament 2004Essentials Pack:

You have just reinstalled UT2004 and want to checksome old demos, but of course you need some files which you can’t findanywhere, or maybe you just want to get started with UT2004 right away withouthaving to search the net dry for everything you need.The solution is here, an easy to install pack that includes the latest patch,the most played 1on1 and TDM maps along with a large amount of cache files,taken directly from the UnrealNorth cache archive.

Download: [ esreality.com ]

• BeyondUnrealspoke with Epic’s Steve Polge about Unreal Tournament III, whichdiscusses the gameplay changes from previous iterations of the franchise.
• Gametrailers.composted a video interview with Midway’sAdam Hanson on the same topic, with the bonus of interspersed game clips forillustration.

There’s been some Linux kernel developmentdrama over the past few weeks: the Completely Fair Scheduler is slated tobe introduced in Linux 2.6.23 over Con Kolivas’ Staircase Deadline scheduler,much to Kolivas’chagrin. The ensuing debate caused Linux creator Linus Torvalds to weigh in:

On Sat, 28 Jul 2007, Kasper Sandberg wrote:
> Im still not so keen about this, Ingo never did get CFS to match SD in
> smoothness for 3d applications, where my test subjects are quake(s),
> world of warcraft via wine, unreal tournament 2004. And this is despite
> many patches he sent me to try and tweak it.

You realize that different people get different behaviour, don’t you?Maybe not.

People who think SD was “perfect” were simply ignoring reality. Sadly,that seemed to include Con too, which was one of the main reasons that Inever ended entertaining the notion of merging SD for very long at all:Con ended up arguing against people who reported problems, rather thantrying to work with them.

[...]

On Sat, 28 Jul 2007, Jonathan Jessup wrote:
>
> Linus, there is a complaint about the Linux kernel, this complaint is that
> the Linux kernel isn’t giving priorities to desktop interactivity and
> experience. The response on osnews.com etc have shown that there is public
> demand for it too.

No, the response on osnews.com only shows that there are a lot of armchaircomplainers around.

People are suggesting that you’d have a separate “desktop kernel”. That’sinsane. It also shows total ignorance of maintainership, and reality. AndI bet most of the people there haven’t tested _either_ scheduler, theyjust like making statements.

The fact is, I’ve _always_ considered the desktop to be the most importantpart. And I suspect that that actually is true for most kernel developers,because quite frankly, that’s what 99% of them ends up using. If a kerneldeveloper uses Windows for his day-to-day work, I sure as hell wouldn’twant to have him developing Linux. That has nothing to do with anythinganti-windows: but the whole “eat your own dogfood” is a very fundamentalthing, and somebody who doesn’t do that shouldn’t be allowed to be even_close_ to a compiler!

So the whole argument about how kernel developers think that the desktopisn’t important is totally made-up crap by Con, and then parrotted byosnews and other places.

The fact is, most kernel developers realize that Linux is used indifferent places, on different machines, and with different loads. Youcannot make _everybody_ happy, but you can try to do as good a job aspossible. And doing “as good a job as possible” very much includes notfocusing on any particular load.

And btw, “the desktop” isn’t actually one single load. It’s in fact a lotof very different loads, and different people want different things. Whatmakes the desktop so interesting is in fact that it shows more variedusage than any other niche – and no, 3D gaming isn’t “it”.

At any rate, CFS should perform better than the stock scheduler has; feel freeto share your experiences with either in the comments below!

The nominees forthe 2007 Game Critics Awards have been announced, based their showings at E3 2007. Of note, id Software’s Enemy Territory: Quake Wars (Best PCGame, Best Online Multiplayer Game) and Epic Games’ Unreal Tournament III (BestAction Game, Best Online Multiplayer Game) each received two nominations.

A reader pointed out that Gears ofWar, Epic’s 2006 third-person action game, isboundfor Mac OSX. As UnrealTournament 3 will be releasedfor Linux and Mac OSX, I suppose there’s an outside shot of a Linux portbeing developed. That said, Unreal II(their previous single player focused title) was never ported,and Microsoft GameStudios was the original publisher, so I won’t be holding my breath for it :)

BeyondUnreal has posted some moreUnreal Tournament 3 media fromE3:

• Three newscreenshots, and box art
• Confirmationthat the PC version ships in November, and more screenshots

There’s also a preview at1up.com which discusses the single-player campaign and vehicles.

Voodoo Extreme has posted a new trailer released for E3 of Unreal Tournament 3, which gives a release date of November 2007 for Epic’s next first-person shooter. The state of a Linux port, or when it would become available, is unknown, although Unreal Tournament 2004 did have the Linux version included in the retail package.

edit: strike that last, thanks to a reader for pointing out this forum post from Epic’s Mark Rein:

We will also support Mac and Linux as per usual.

BeyondUnrealhas posted some media from the upcoming Frag.Ops version 2.20, a multiplayer UT2004 modification with tacticalteam gameplay and vehicles. There are screenshots and avideo trailer showcasing the new maps.

Version 1.7 of Tactical Operations:Crossfire, a counter-terrorism-themed multiplayer modification for Unreal Tournament 2004, has beenreleased. The changelog includes bugfixes, new UI and effects features,gameplay tweaks, additional maps and player models, and administrativeimprovements.

Screenshots: [ View] Download: [ to-crossfire.net ]

Version 2 of BallisticWeapons, a modification for UT2004 which adds an arsenal ofweaponry, was released last month. Here’s the spiel:

Fling enemies into the sky and shove them around with the Lightning Gun,annihilate opponents with 3600 RPM of pure minigun death, scorch with theflamer thrower, destroy with rockets, grenades and energy weapons, and mowdown the opposition with machineguns, shotguns and assault rifles! Explodingflamethrower tanks, mountable weapons, heat-seeking rockets, dual-wieldablehandguns, and stylish weaponry are just some of the many things that BW offersto players.

Download: [ runestorm.za.net ]

• 1up.com hasposted a new preview of Unreal Tournament III, the next title inEpic Games’first-person shooter series.
• GameVideos.com has avideo up of multiplayer gameplay in UT3 (deathmatch and CTF); there are alsomirrors @ ESReality.
• Version 4.1 of Strike Force,a Unreal Tournament 2004 modwith an emphasis on fun gameplay over strict realism, was released. There’s along list of new features at the official website too lengthy to enumeratehere; suffice to say there’s improvements and fixes across the board, as wellas new maps.
• Version 1.32 of AlienSwarm is also out; there’s also a link to a new campaign: Escape from Rhea. Alien Swarm is acooperative-multiplayer UT2004 mod played from an overhead perspective.

Linux.com has posted a review of Frets On Fire, an open-source musical skill game:

You suck on electric guitar. If you are not aware of that now, you will be after playing Frets on Fire — a cross-platform, GPLed music game from Unreal Voodoo, where your PC’s keyboard is the instrument and you play lead.

Download: [ kempele.fi ]

Version 1.6 of TO:Crossfire, a total-conversion modification for Unreal Tournament 2004, is now available. New features:

• A new map, OBJ-Infernum
• Improved weapon balance
• Map fixes for performance and bugs
• Tracer fire for the AK47 and M4A1
• Directional exit wound effects
• Different weapon muzzleflashes
• Bugfixes and exploit blocks

Screenshots: [ View ] Download: [ to-crossfire.net ]

BeyondUnreal posted news that Midway Games and Epic Games have announced Unreal Tournament 2007 will now be released as Unreal Tournament 3 (presumably UT2003 and UT2004 are counted together as “UT2″). BeyondUnreal also has a hands-on preview with impressions from a recent Midway press event.

UT3 utilizes Unreal Engine 3; favorable comments by Epic’s Mark Rein during E3 2005 (in the context of PS3 development) imply that Epic will be continuing it’s historical support for Linux with this title.

Version 1.5 of the popular Unreal Tournament 2004 mod, TO Crossfire 1.5 , has been released. This release which features two new maps has the following updates to gameplay.

• Reward system tweaks (2×750 for first loss, 2×750 for second and 3×750 for third consecutive loss)
• Ingame admin system added
• Hostage crouch pose
• Hostage pushable by players
• Increased hostage running speed
• Increased jump height when scoped
• Increased running speed
• Increased crouch walk speed
• Tweaked air control
• Tweaked strafe speed
• Mac/Linux torso twist bug fixed
• Reward when killing hostage bug fixed
• Added faster running when holding the knife

Download: [ TO Crossfire 1.5]

The Unreal Tournament 2004modification Defense Alliance 2reached their Beta 1.6 milestone earlier this month. The FAQ page describesand this video depicts the humans versus AI gameplay; there’s also an online game manual.

Screenshots: [ View ] Download: [ planetunreal.com ]

The latest Linux Games Podcast episode is up. Podcast 4 brings you an informal interview with Michael “Briareos” Vance.

Joining myself on this episode are: Dustin “Crusader” Reyes, Matt “Southern Belle JVM” Matthews, and Marv “Transform and Pod Cast” Malkowski. New in this episode are some format changes and a short advertisement for Love Invaders. Remember to send your advertisements for free-as-in-either-beer-or-speech games to zacharyslater@gmail.com. Please also note that although this podcast was recorded on the 28th as I indicate during the intro, it is only being posted now on the Third. My apologies for the delay.

URL dump from this episode:

• Gate 88
• Marathon Rubicon
• Bill Kendrick’s Tux Paint
• Virtual Kendrick
• Aleph One
• Unreal Editor Linux Support Announcement
• Mega Mario
• Stendhal Screenshot
• ixsoft.de
• Linux Game Publishing
• Ryan Gordon
• Michael Phillips
• Majesty
• Neverwinter Nights 2
• Gavriel State’s Funny Hat

iTunes users can click the iTunes Only link below, or drag and drop the feed link to iTunes, or click Advanced – Subscribe to Podcast and copy the feed url there, or just hit update if you’ve already subscribed. The podcast is also in the iTunes Music Store. For any other podcasting programs, you’ll need to insert the feed url into it.

Enjoy, leave feedback here, in the new forum, on iTunes, and tell your friends!

Linux Games Podcast 4 Download: [ iTunes Only | MP3 RSS Feed | Straight MP3 | Straight Ogg]

A reader wrote in to let us know about the Guitar Hero ( \m/ ) clone Frets on Fire by the Unreal Voodoo team. Unfortunately as yet you’re limited to the keyboard, though I suspect it is probably possible to use a playstation 2 game controller adaptor and joy2key to produce a funner experience.

Frets on Fire version 184 Download: [ kempele.fi ]